The 3-5-2, and how far apart those wing backs really are
Soccer · Formation · 11 of your players
Three centre backs, two wing backs holding the touchlines almost sixty metres apart, a midfield three between them and a front pair. Load it and move the players your team does differently.
Opens on a soccer pitch with the shape already drawn. Free, no signup.
Reading the shape
Three centre backs sit in a shallow arc about thirteen metres off the goal line, with the middle one deepest and the two outside him a touch higher. In front of them, five: a centre midfielder just behind the other two, and the wing backs — the two players this shape lives and dies on — out on the touchlines. Then a front pair, level with each other, a few metres short of the halfway line.
Look at how wide the wing backs actually are. Each one is within five metres of the paint, which puts nearly sixty metres of pitch between them. That is the point of the back three: you have a spare defender centrally, so you can afford to send both flanks away from the defensive line entirely.
When it earns its place
Pick it when your best two players are athletic wide players and you would rather not ask them to defend a full back's starting position. Three inside midfielders against a midfield two gives you a spare man in the middle third, and the front pair means you always have someone to hit and someone to run off him — which a lone striker cannot do for you.
The cost is honest and it is always the same: if a wing back is caught upfield, your back three is defending the full width of the pitch on its own. Teams that beat a 3-5-2 do it by switching the ball quickly to the flank the wing back has just left.
What to coach
- Which wing back goes. Both at once is a 3-3-4 and nobody meant to draw that. Drag one forward, leave the other level with the centre backs, and animate it so the players see the swap.
- The spare centre back. Draw the ball wide and show the outside centre back stepping out to meet it while the other two shuffle across. That slide is the whole defensive shape.
- Front two, split. Move one striker short and one beyond, then play the pass. Two strikers standing on the same line are one striker.
Open the 3-5-2 in the designer, push the wing back you actually push, and draw the overlap you want him making.
Also known as
- back three
- wing backs
- midfield overload
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Put the 3-5-2 on a pitch
It opens with the shape already drawn. Move the players your team does differently, drag the runs, and send your squad a link that animates.
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